NEW YORK (Fortune) -- Stocks will be under pressure as long as it looks like war in the Middle East, rebels are agitating in Nigeria, North Korea keeps on saber rattling, oil and gas prices surge, and tech stocks get downgraded. Got that?

ROSNEFT: Russian oil IPO anyone? That nation's second largest oil company is set to go public next Wednesday in Russia and London. Looking to raise $10 billion. This would be Russia's biggest IPO ever, the fifth largest worldwide. This would give it a market cap of nearly $80 billion, which would make it bigger than Lukoil, Russia's biggest oil company. Go figure. Prediction: Over time this may do okay, but it will be extremely volatile and you might bail out at the bottom. Careful!.....BTW, if this is too exotic for you, Hertz is going public soon too.

GARMIN: This is an intriguing little company. Makes GPS units. Stock is up 148 percent over the past 11 months. How cool is that. Ticker is GRMN (Charts). Company operates out of Olathe, Kan., but it's based in Cayman Islands: Whatever! Management thinks that GPS units will soon move from being just a specialty product to the mainstream. Hmm. Maybe not iPods, but I can see some more ubiquity here. It's an expensive stock so be careful, but sometimes growth stocks are expensive and go up for years.

FOREST LABORATORIES: Could be a mover today, but as for the long run, I'm less sure. Short run: good news. A U.S. court upheld a patent on a best selling antidepressant drug, Lexapro, in a suit against Teva Pharma. Shares in Forest, which makes drugs that treat depression and Alzheimer's, were up some 18 percent after hours. FRX (Charts) makes both branded and generic drugs. Okay, so what's wrong with that? Nothing really except that branded drug makers are getting sued and the generics are facing pressure from the branded makers. Got it?

Loose Change: Producer Ashley does not a like the Patti LaBelle OneTouch commercial. Producer Paul does. What do you think?.... Did you see the story about the 80 year-old-guy who was selling crack and using the proceeds to pay for prostitutes...... And then there's Pete Coors' problems. Stay clean this weekend people!!!!! (I'm off next week, happy trails!)

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E-mail Andy Serwer at serwer@fortunemail.com

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